of the Fisher If Board Jor Scotland. 



59 



and eleven and a half inches. In the course of the investigations the 

 number of cod and codlings recorded was 9631, grouped as follows : — 



Codling. 

 II. 



From about 8^ or 9 

 inches to 11^ inches 

 and under two 

 years old. 



Codling. 

 I. 



from about 11 J 

 inches to about 27 

 inches, and from 

 under two to about 

 four years old. 



Cod. 



From about 27 

 inches upwards, 

 and from about 



four years old 

 upwards. 



1,416 

 7o 14-7 



5,722 

 59-4 



2,493 

 Vo 25-9 



The first series of small codlings thus represents only a difference of 

 about three inches from the smallest to the largest, and a correspond- 

 ingly small range of age ; the large codling represent a difference of 

 about fifteen and a half inches, and the group of cod a range of usually 

 about twelve or thirteen inches, but it may be much more. 



Although very young cod, younger than those included in the Table, 

 are not quite absent from the bottom on the offshore deep-water grounds, 

 the use of the small-meshed net showed that they were rare, compared 

 with the grounds in moderate depths. But, as Hjort's investigations 

 have shown, they may exist in fair numbers in the upper layers of water, 

 descending to the bottom as they increase in size. Compared with 

 many other fishes, the cod at all stages of its life appears normally to be 

 a widely-dispersed fish. 1 have been struck with this in examining the 

 hauls on the trawlers, a few, and only a few, cod or codlings being 

 generally taken in each drag. During the greater part of the year they 

 are dispersed and scattered, searching for food, collecting into shoals as 

 the spawning season approaches, and congregating in pursuit of the 

 herrings when that fish forms into shoals at certain times of the year. 

 The low proportion of cod and large codling in September, as indicated 

 in the Table above, may have been due to the latter reason, and the 

 high averages in the early part of the year on the inshore grounds 

 largely to the former. The occurrence, however, of a shoal of herrings 

 or sprats on the coast, as in the Moray Firth in December and Aberdeen 

 Bay in October, attracts great numbers of cod of all sizes. Some of the 

 quite small codlings were found to be gorged with sprats and young 

 herrings, and they were also living largely on the young whitings. 



Saithe or Coal-fish {Gadus virens). 



Comparatively few of this predaceous fish were obtained during the 

 investigations, and they were nearly all large and marketable, the 

 younger forms being known to frequent the inshore grounds. The 

 total number obtained was 266, of which all but ten were large enough 

 to be marketable. Ten were got in the large series of hauls in Aberdeen 

 Bay, mostly in summer ; sixty-five in the Moray Firth, especially in 

 January, February, and March; while on the deep-water grounds they 

 were much more numerous, 185 being procured there in comparatively 

 many fewer hauls. They were most numerous in the hauls made in 

 May, off the Aberdeenshire coast, in from sixty-four to seventy-one 

 fathoms, the average per haul there being 16*2, and per hour's fishing 



